Wall St. Cheat Sheet

Shares of Angie's List (ANGI-4.1%) tail off on day 2 of trading as volume comes in a bit lighter. The now-public company bucks the notion a paid-content model won't work on the Internet with 70% of first-year subscribers re-upping their memberships - a percentage that jumps to 87% for people who have been members for five years or more. Will the success of Angie's list and the New York Timespaywall have other content companies talking about dipping their toe in the paid-content pool? [View news story]

This post is a joke. Cost of customer acquisition is rising. Anyone can get subs to pay less than the cost of acquisition.

Angie's List has the potential to be an epic failure for IPO investors. Read the details of their SEC filing. It's all classic Wall Street smoke and mirrors.

InvestorPlace's Jeff Reeves makes the bear case for Chipotle (CMG-0.4%), calling it a "favorite to flop." For starters, he cites runaway food inflation squeezing margins and a "nosebleed" P/E ratio of 39, before lining up the historic record of restaurants that grow too fast. "The fact is you can only build so many stores so quickly to prop up growth. Eventually the market becomes saturated or the rate of expansion is no longer large enough to materially impact earnings and sales growth." [View news story]

With all due respect to Jeff, these "reasons" are extremely weak. Here are a few things he should research:

1) how many units Chipotle has and how many would actually be market saturation outside his experience in NYC.

2) Chipotle's foods are organic and fresh. Sure, an entire burrito is 800 calories, but most people only eat half at a time. That's a huge amount of quality food for what Jeff considers an expensive $8. Try eating lunch at Whole Foods and that will look like a major bargain for the same amount of high quality food. Not to mention, customers are not a current problem for CMG.

3) The narrow menu is what makes the concept brilliant on the back end. Chipotle is able to keep their food super fresh and keep costs low because they focus their menu. Definitely not a problem. And I don't know about most people, but when I want a burrito I don't need to have 50 other options. Mexican food can be simple. That's part of the appeal.

4) PF Changs is an absurd comparison for CMG. Really? Any decent hedge fund would laugh that one out of the room.

In conclusion, the only truly researched and valid point here is the high P/E. But once you look up how many units Chipotle has built and how many more the world can handle (and let me give you a hint: YUM and MCD are decades ahead in their buildouts), you'll note the growth PE can last for many more years.

Real Estate Is Not a Good Investment When Interest Rates Are Low [View article]

Wells Fargo (WFC) statement on today's court ruling: "The loans at issue... were not originated, owned, serviced or foreclosed upon by Wells Fargo. As trustee of a securitized pool of loans, Wells Fargo expects the entities who service these loans to abide by all applicable state laws... The court simply set forth a standard legal process that mortgage servicers must follow in Massachusetts." [View news story]

An expanding global economy should push oil prices above $100/barrel this year, which could lift shares of oil and gas companies by 25-30% and help double the price of coal stocks, BlackRock's Daniel Rice says. The "holy grail" would be if scientists find a way to cut carbon emissions from burning coal - “It could mean billions and billions of profits" for coal companies. [View news story]

A new hedge fund will use Tweets to gauge market sentiment. Derwent Capital Markets' trading model, based on a recent study, uses notable shifts in the use of emotional trigger words to determine changes in sentiment - which normally precede major market moves by 2-6 days. [View news story]

My sources say they use Twitter as a contrarian indicator. Meaning, it's the newest way to take money from the herd.

Sources said AOL (AOL-0.7%) is abandoning its rumored quest to merge with Yahoo (YHOO-0.2%), leaving the ailing firm to struggle on alone. “Yahoo didn't bite, and AOL didn't have its ducks lined up to be a buyer," claims an insider. Now it's unclear if AOL has any more big, quick turnaround options left. [View news story]

Shocker. This was BS from the beginning, as anyone who does M&A would know.

That is a great thought. I think the only issue at this point is ramping up infrastructure to deal with a huge user jump that would occur if they also had free. They are already having issues with Akamai.

Amazon (AMZN) will strike back today at Google's (GOOG) eBooks initiative by unveiling an improved Kindle for the Web. The offering will "enable users to read full books in the browser," says a spokeswoman. Amazon is +0.7% to $179.37. [View news story]

Aggressive Chinese gold buying is "a big secular trend that's not going to end in 2010," Jim Cramer says, adding that with gold in short supply it could rise to $2,000/ounce. His favorite stocks to play the metal are NovaGold (NG) and Agnico-Eagle (AEM). Chinese demand also is lifting copper prices, he says, which would benefit Freeport-McMoRan (FCP). [View news story]